CHAPTER VIII
The Fugitive Soldier
THE Cottage door closed behind the three excited parents and AuntyJane. The four Cottagers, all decidedly pale and subdued, looked at oneanother in silence. It is one thing to confess a fault; it is quiteanother to be ignominiously found out. Jean and Bettie and Marjorywere feeling this very keenly; but Mabel was far more troubled at theprospect of losing Rosa Marie.
"The orphan asylum!" breathed Bettie, at length.
"It's wicked," blazed Mabel, "to make an orphan of a person that isn't."
"I've heard," said Marjory, reflectively, "that orphans have to eatfried liver."
"Horrors!" gasped Mabel.
"And codfish."
"Oh _horrors_!" moaned Mabel, who detested both liver and codfish.
"And prunes," pursued teasing Marjory, wickedly remembering Mabel'sdislike for that wholesome but insipid fruit. The prunes provedentirely too much for Mabel.
"Pup--pup--prunes!" she sobbed. "And you stand there and don't do athing to save her! I guess if I were Eliza escaping with my baby oncakes of ice----"
"Rosa Marie's about the right color," giggled Marjory, who could notresist so fine an opportunity to tease excitable Mabel.
"You'd all be glad enough to help, but when it's just me----"
"Oh, we'll help," soothed Jean, slipping an arm about Mabel. "You knowwe always do stand by you."
"Yes, we'll all help," promised Bettie, "if you'll just tell us what todo. Only _please_ don't get us into any more trouble with our mothers."
"There's the cellar," suggested Mabel, doubtfully, yet withglimmerings of hope. "I read a story once about a lady who sat on acellar door, knitting stockings."
"Why in the world," demanded Marjory, "did she sit on the door?"
"Some soldiers were hunting for an escaped prisoner and she had himhidden there."
"Was the cellar all horrid with old papers and rats and mice andspiders and crawly things with legs?" asked Bettie, with interest.
"I hope not," shuddered Mabel, "but a soldier wouldn't mind. Dear me, Iwish we'd cleaned that cellar when we first came into the Cottage. Ifwe had, it'd be just the place to hide Rosa Marie in."
"Perhaps it isn't too late, now," said Marjory, stooping to loosen thering in the kitchen floor. "Let's look down there, anyway."
"Let's," agreed Bettie. "It'll be something to do, at least."
Everybody helped with the door. When it was open and propped againstthe kitchen stove, the four girls crouched down to peer into the depthsbelow. Even Rosa Marie, who had been released from the table-leg, creptto the edge to look.
They were not very deep depths. The place was filled with rubbish,mostly old papers and broken pasteboard boxes; but it was perfectlydry, and clean except for a thick layer of dust.
"Let's clean it out," said Mabel, recklessly grasping an armful ofdusty papers and dragging them forth.
"Phew!" exclaimed Jean, tumbling back from the hole. "Er--er--er hash!"
"Oh, ki--_hash_! Hoo!" blubbered Bettie, likewise tumbling backwards.
"Who-is-she, who-is-she," sneezed Marjory.
"Kerchoo, kerchoo, kerchoo!" sneezed Rosa Marie, her head bobbing witheach sneeze. "Kerchoo, kerchoo!"
"It's pepper," explained Mabel, when she had finished _her_ sneeze. "Ispilled a lot of it the day of Mr. Black's dinner party. I didn't knowwhat else to do with it, so I swept it down that biggest crack."
"Goodness! What a housekeeper!" rebuked Jean, wiping her eyes.
"It's good for moths," consoled Bettie. "At any rate, Rosa Marie won'tget moth-eaten."
"Perhaps," suggested Mabel, hopefully, "it's driven away all the ratsand crawly things."
Working more cautiously, the girls drew forth the yellowed papers andpasteboard left by some former untidy occupant of the Cottage. Theyburned most of the rubbish in the kitchen stove, Jean standing guardlest burning pieces should escape to set fire to the Cottage. The workof clearing the cellar, indeed, was precisely what the girls needed,after the humiliating events of the day. All four were growing morecheerful; but they worked as swiftly as they dared, for they feltcertain that the cellar, as a place of concealment for Rosa Marie,would be speedily needed.
The cellar proved to be a square hole about three feet deep. WhenMabel, who for once was doing the lion's share of the work, had sweptthe boarded floor and sides perfectly clean, it was really a very tidy,inviting little shelter; as neat a shelter as fugitive soldier coulddesire.
"Now," said Mabel, "we'll put a piece of carpet and an old quilt in thebottom, tack clean papers around the sides----"
"Papers rattle," offered Marjory, sagely.
"Then we'll use cloth," declared Mabel, snatching an apron from thehook behind the door. "We'll begin right away to practise with RosaMarie, so she'll get used to it. Then we must rehearse our parts, too."
The retreat ready, Rosa Marie went without a murmur into theunderground babytender--Marjory gave it that name. Rosa Marie, atleast, would do her part successfully. But it was different aboveground.
"Who," demanded Jean, "is to sit on the door and knit? _I_couldn't--I'd fly to pieces."
"It's my child," said Mabel, "_I'm_ going to."
"But," objected Marjory, "you _can't_ knit. You don't know how."
"I can crochet," triumphed Mabel, "and I guess that's every bit asgood."
"Where," asked Bettie, "is your crochet hook?"
But that, of course, was a question that Mabel could not answer,because Mabel never did know where any of her belongings were.Thereupon, Jean, Marjory and Mabel began a frantic search for themissing article. Mabel had used it the week previously; but couldremember nothing more about it.
"Goodness!" groaned Mabel, groveling under the spare-room bed in hopesthat the hook might be there. "If I'd dreamed that my child's life wasgoing to depend on that hook, I'd have kept it locked up in father'sfire-proof safe."
"That's what you get," said Marjory, with one eye glued to the top of avery tall vase, "for being so careless. It isn't in here, anyway."
"Here's one," announced Bettie, scrambling in hastily and locking thedoor behind her. "I skipped home for it. But there's no time to lose.All our mothers and Aunty Jane are going out of Mrs. Mapes's gate withtheir best hats and gloves on. There's something doing!"
In another moment, the cellar door was closed, a rocking chair wasplaced upon it, and Mabel, with ball of yarn and crochet hook in hand,was nervously twitching in the chair. Her fingers were stiff withdust--there had been no time to wash them--so the loop that she tiedin the end of the white yarn was most decidedly black; but Mabel wasthankful to achieve a loop of any color, with her whole body quiveringwith excitement and suspense.
"Goodness!" she quavered. "That soldier lady was a wonder! Think ofher looking calm outside with her heart going like a Dover egg-beater.Do--do _I_ look calm?"
"Here," said Bettie, extending a basin of warm water. "Soak your handsin this. Warm water is said to be soothing."
"Also cleansing," giggled Marjory.
"Hurry!" gasped quick-eared Jean, snatching the basin and hurling atowel in Mabel's direction. "I heard our gate click. There's somebodycoming."
"Don't let 'em in," breathed Mabel, defiantly.
"I'm afraid," said Jean, "we'll have to."
"Anyway," soothed Bettie, "we'll peek first--there's the door-bell!"